Five teenage girls, in five separate cities, were "lured" from their homes and sexually assaulted. Somewhere, somehow, it has been inferred that someone using an online MySpace account "lured" the girls out of the safety of their homes.

MySpace has been charged with negligence. Why?

MySpace is no more responsible for the action of someone leaving the safety and security of their home unprotected, than say Wal-Mart.

And while I'm off on a rant I have few other things I would like to point out to or ask of my fellow sapients. Feel free to send me your opinions, comments, etc.

1. Shovels do not make holes people make holes with shovels; corollary to that is that guns do not make holes people make holes with guns.

2. Females do not ask for males to rape them, males rape females to demonstrate dominance and power over the femalerape is not a sexual act; corollary to that is that females who didn't like or were caught performing a sexual act have not been raped.

3. Pizza delivery people arrive at your home faster than police called for an emergency. No corollary.

4. Your rights have and continue to be eroded in such an insipid fashion that when it happens you usually don't even notice.

5. Internet = Freedom, but freedom is not maintained without due diligence and sacrifice by those who are free.

6. Czar Nicholas II of Russia was assured by his Government that no harm would come to him and his family, until harm came to him and his family; corollary to this do you believe that you are any safer today than he was at the turn of the last centuryif you say yes then you don't know that you don't know.

7. If you have nothing to fear because you have done nothing wrong, then why did you let the Government give you a number for your name, just like a prison inmate?

8. If we are free, why do we now need "papers" just to board airplanes, like the citizens of the former Soviet Union?

9. If it's only the "bad people" whose phone lines are being listened to, then why does anyone's phone number get flagged if they say key words like; bomb, President, and so on?

10. If you are "innocent until proven guilty" then why are people arrested "on suspicion of. . . " rather than actual charges, and if you're "innocent until proven guilty" why does the state restrict people's activities and even lodge them before trial?

11. Why are parents no longer responsible for the actions of their underage children?

12. Why do we send our children to schools that crush the individuality and creative thinking out of them?

13. Why do we still tolerate schools that are little more than factories for children? They punch in, do their work, take a break, do their work, break for lunch, do their work, punch out and go home, and their bosses make them bring work home with them! Did I say factories? I meant sweatshops, because if they don't work they are forced to come back more often and for more years until they do the work.

14. If I film a demon sexually assaulting a woman and then bathing in her warm carcass and blood the movie is entertainment (R Rated), but if I film a man tenderly washing and drying a woman by candlelight and follow that with a scene of sex, physical contact and sharing it's pornography (X Rated)!

15. If a tree falls in the woods and no one was around did it make any noise; corollary if I smoke marijuana instead of tobacco in my house and no one is around have I broken the law?

16. If police are sworn to uphold the law, why is it that the first thing they do is entitle themselves to undermine and break the law with impunity?

17. Why are Doctors a protected class of individuals who can demand that you show for your appointment on-time or ahead of time, only to make you wait an additional hour before the nurse removes you from the waiting-room, and another half-hour before you actually see the doctorbut if your 5 minutes late for your appointment the doctor no longer has time to see you?

18. Am I the only one who sees a future headline reading "Disgruntled patient kills five in Dr's office"?

19. Lawyers = Evil So how come no one walks into attorney's offices and starts blowing people away, it's always some dumb postal employee on a bender or a school kid who wasn't parentally supervised.

20. Nick Nolte made a movie a while back called "Extreme Prejudice" that contained one of my all-time favorite movie lines; "Damn son, there's only one thing lower than a child molester and that's a politician!"

Maybe I'm just ignorant, but don't you have to actually be doing something "under the influence" before you can be arrested for it? The following insert appeared in the American Police Beat online magazine, under their humorous bits section!

BUI?
A cruise ship captain has pleaded guilty to operating a Celebrity Cruise Line vessel that was carrying 1,884 passengers while he was under the influence of alcohol. Officers with the U.S. Coast Guard arrested Periklis Petridis, a Greek citizen in command of the Mercury cruise liner hours before the ship was scheduled to depart from a Seattle pier for Alaska. During a routine Coast Guard check, officials discovered the captain had been drinking. Breath tests showed Petridis, 47, had a blood alcohol level as high as 0.181, more than four times the federal maritime limit for operating a ship.

I must confess I am not amused, not even a little bit, and nonot at all. Note; second sentence, line four states ". . .hours before the ship was scheduled to depart. . . ."

So what had this Greek citizen done wrong? He drank alcohol aboard the ship he Captains, wow, looks like the free world has a lot to learn about how to behave in the good ole' US of A!

First, Captain Petridis was not underway and stopped say, in Puget Sound, but hours away from actually moving the ship.

Second, I believe that large cruise ships have more than one person on board that actually move the boat around using the engines.

Third, doesn't Captain Petridis have a bunk of his own to "sleep it off" in, does he not live aboard his ship and have a chain-of-command to assume the responsibilities for the safety of the passengers should he be incapacitated by; illness, drink, or simply sleep?

Finally, aren't all of my points valid or has the Coast Guard been granted unconstitutional powers to arrest without cause?

This is not Nazi Germany, Soviet Russia, Red China or North Korea; no they were rank amateurs when it comes to infringing libertieseveryone could tell what they were doing. The United States Government and its system of 200+ years of thuggery should be required reading for all Terrorist Trainees. Rank amateurs the Al-Qaeda, all they can figuratively do is smash printing presses and burn villages of defenseless people in front of Allah and everybody, making them somewhat less than popular, the US Government does so as welland then successfully holds the broken presses and burnt bodies responsible for the Government's atrocities. As I said rookies, freshmen, rank amateurs, no wonder their popularity wanes.

The U.S. Coast Guard could give the Terrorists of the world a few pointers as well, the people you want to terrorize don't actually have to be guilty of anything, just make something up.

I am embarrassed and ashamed of the actions of my countrymen.

To Celebrity Cruise Lines, I apologize for the rash and unprovoked attack of my totalitarian-like government.

To Captain Petridis; you sir, have my sympathies and a recommendation that you seek Legal Counsel at your first convenience.

And to Greece, I apologize for my government's terrorizing of one of your citizens for having done nothing wrong.